Steffen Peddie 99 Problems and the Chips aren’t one!

Steffen Peddie 99 Problems and the Chips aren’t one! is touring around the UK at the moment. We headed to the Washington Arts Centre on Friday night for a night of entertainment.

I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Steffen Peddie before in his show the Geordie Rat Pack at the Customs House. The Geordie Rat Pack can only be described as a bizarre show. With his pals Jason Cook, Neil Grainger and Glen Roughead they perform the rat pack classics in their own unique way. Singing with a live big band interspersed with comedy, mickey takes and lots of banter. At one point they came around the audience with a tray of lurid green Aftershock! Tickets for their next show at the Customs House in August are now on sale.

Steffen is also known for his TV role as Big Keith in the comedy Hebburn. His mate, and fellow, Geordie Rat Packer Jason Cook, actually wrote this sitcom. Big Keith was the typical loud mouthed chav in the show, which is unlike the man himself.

Steffen Peddie 99 Problems and the Chips aren’t one!

The Washington Arts Centre was quite an intimate setting for a comedy night. And the one thing I know from comedy shows is, to make sure you don’t stand out too much. So the last thing I wanted to do was photograph Steffen Peddie Live on Stage. So to remain suitable anonymous I photographed his chair / water bottle holder with a purple backdrop.

My Dad headed off to the bar, as we went to the toilets. Back at the venue we found a table next to the bar, but there was no sign of my Dad. The bar he went to was attached to a very busy restaurant. Quite a hive of activity was the Washington Arts Centre.

Dad located and drink in hand, we were handed a slip of paper and asked to write down our problems. Steffen was acting as an Agony Aunt and would solve your problems while cracking jokes. It’s hard to think of one when you are put on the spot, but i’d just had a little tustle with Imogen over her cheeky attitude, so wrote as my problem ‘My 9 year old thinks she is a teenager’. Problems were put into the jar on the stage. Alan was either being very polite or didn’t want to risk my wrath so didn’t write one down. Glad to know he has no problems!

99 Problems

Steffen came on around 8.30pm and started by saying. ‘Yes I’m fat…now we’ve got that out of the way I’ll start with the show’. Jokes about Washington (and the districts that bemuse everyone!) kicked off the night. Steffen also had an interesting story of meeting his American wife at a summer camp, losing touch (they both got married and had kids) then years later they got back in touch when they were single. Happy story. His American wife lives in Killingworth with their four kids! Steffen has also lost 6 stone in the last few months, so we will actually be seeing less of him! An interesting bloke and the night flew by:

Onto some of the Problems….

“People who use parent and child parking bays”

“I come back from the bar and my wife is sitting with two blokes”

“I never had a problem till I saw this piece of paper in front of me”

“My cowboy builder has ran off without finishing the job”

By bringing in the audience and asking them for more details it really felt like you were part of the show. And if you go to see him there’ll be a new host of problems for Steffen to solve! By the way, he didn’t really have a solution to my problem, he empathised and said it would get worse when she is a teenager for real. We’ve got that to look forward to!! Steffen has 8 year old girl twins so said my problem is half the size of his! Cannot argue with the logic.

Chips comes into the show as Steffen said in the digital age people don’t talk to each other enough. If you think you friend may be depressed or need someone to talk to, pop round with a fresh bag of chips and share them. There’s nothing better to get the conversation going.

Sounds like an interesting concept for a comedy night. I have yet to visit Washington Arts Centre but we have tickets to Chalk’s Sgt Pepper’s Family Rave in a few months and I’m looking forward to our first visit.